Zucker’s ‘New Face of CNN’ Sinks to New Ratings Low

CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker has called him "the new face of CNN," but it doesn’t appear to be a face viewers want to see. Jake Tapper’s new 4 p.m. ET CNN program, "The Lead with Jake Tapper," hit a new low in viewers 25-54 Wednesday, according to Deadline.com.

The show drew 61,000 viewers in the adults 25-54 demo, in what Deadline calls "the worst the one-hour CNN show has done since its soft March 18 debut." The program pulled 318,000 total viewers.

It has done worse in total viewers, drawing only 258,000 viewers on March 22, although it attracted 68,000 viewers in the demo on that day.

“The best the Tapper-fronted show has done came on March 26, when it pulled in 433,000 viewers and 113,000 among 25-54,” the story reports. “The show debuted with 400,000 viewers and 87,000 in the demo. But that’s cold comfort when Wednesday’s edition was well behind the 1.222 million viewers who watched Fox New Channel’s ‘Your World With Neil Cavuto’ in the same time slot; the FNC show pulled in 199,000 in thedemo. ‘The Lead’ was also behind MSNBC’s ‘Martin Bashir,’ which drew 383,000 viewers but doubled CNN with 124,000 in the key demo.

Through Wednesday, the new CNN show is off 32% in total viewers and 34% in 25-54 from the same period a year ago, when the slot was held down by the first hour of “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.” But “The Lead” has managed to improve on some of Blitzer’s recent numbers.

“In the 4-5 p.m. time slot, ‘Situation Room’ hit 56,000 in the demo on February 5, 54,000 on March 11 and a low of 53,000 on February 26,” the piece reports. “The latter was actually the lowest pull in the demo since November 23, 2007.”